Among GIGABYTE's new motherboard extravaganza, are some of its first socket FM2 motherboards, which based on the new AMD A85 FCH chipset (higher price-points) and previous-generation A55 FCH (lower price-points) and support next-generation "Trinity" APUs. Among these are the high-end F2A85X-UP4 with Ultra Durable 5 construction, mainstream F2A55-DS3, and entry-level F2A55M-DS2 Ultra Durable 1 motherboards.

The F2A85X-UP4 is loaded with top-tier VRM components, including high-current ferrite core chokes, IR3550 PowIRstage driver-MOSFETs, which make up an 8-phase CPU VRM. The FM2 socket is wired to four DDR3 memory slots, with support for dual-channel DDR3-2400 MHz by overclocking; and two PCI-Express 2.0 x16 slots (x8/x8, when both are populated). Other expansion slots include three PCI-Express 2.0 x1, a PCI-Express 2.0 x16 (electrical x4), and a legacy PCI, all of which are wired to the A85 FCH.

The A85 FCH gives out eight SATA 6 Gb/s ports. On the F2A85X-UP4, seven of these are wired out as internal ports, and one as eSATA. There are as many as six USB 3.0 ports, four on the rear panel, two via headers. Display outputs include one each of DVI, D-Sub, HDMI, and DisplayPort; the platform supports triple-monitor Eyefinity for productivity. LucidLogix VirtuMVP is included. Gigabit Ethernet and 8-channel HD audio (ALC898), make for the rest of it.

Moving on, the F2A55-DS3 is a slim ATX motherboard based on the AMD A55 FCH. It uses a simpler 6-phase VRM to power the APU, minus the fancy stuff found on the F2A85X-UP4. It is wired to just two DDR3 DIMM slots, which support dual-channel DDR3-2400 MHz by overclocking, and the lone PCI-Express 2.0 x16 slot. Two legacy PCI, and four PCI-Express 2.0 x1 make for the rest of the expansion slot area. The A55 FCH gives out six SATA 3 Gb/s ports. The only display output on its board is HDMI, and instead of placing a D-Sub next to it, GIGABYTE added an RS232 serial port. A strange choice. Gigabit Ethernet and 6-channel HD audio make for the rest of it.

Lastly, the F2A55M-DS2 forms the baseline of GIGABYTE's socket FM2 motherboard lineup. This compact micro-ATX motherboard is driven by the same A55 FCH chipset, and sticks to the bare essentials, in terms of connectivity. Thankfully, its display output load-out includes a D-Sub, next to a DVI.

Why not? we can put something 2x the power of 680 and will still not saturate the PCIe 2.0, I think we can safely say anyone using FM2 will not get 2x680 performance graphics cards.

Waiting for people complaining about new sockets and how Intel change their sockets faster than we change our underwear. Oh right, this is AMD, so changing sockets before a year is up fine then :) /sarcasm

by: FourstaffWhy not? we can put something 2x the power of 680 and will still not saturate the PCIe 2.0, I think we can safely say anyone using FM2 will not get 2x680 performance graphics cards.

Waiting for people complaining about new sockets and how Intel change their sockets faster than we change our underwear. Oh right, this is AMD, so changing sockets before a year is up fine then :) /sarcasm

How else is AMD supposed to catch up to Intel's 28 released sockets vs AMD's 15 now 16?

by: eidairaman1FM2 is to AMD what Z77 is to Intel, Mainstream Platform

AM3+ is to AMD what X79 is to Intel, High End Platform

Rumours have it that 2 more Gens of CPUs will be for AM3+ before FM2 takes over fully...

true, eventualy AM will die and FM will take over, but only when HSA picks up then the x86 cores(integer cores) become non functional pretty much to sell them on their own as the GPU compute units/shaders will be part of the structure to start with(according to my understanding) which explains why AMD have been strictly focusing on the point that an X86 core is the "INTEGER CORE" and are looking at the FPU as a seperate entity because HSA is when the FPU is replaced by the GPU cores that not only will do FP operations, but will aslo be able to do X86 processing along with the integer cores on tasks that are more parrallel

so your statement is somewhat true, it is important to note that AM3+ is far from similar to x79.
so while i totaly see what you mean by x79 being similar to AM3+ it is important to note a few things

1- AM3+ has many different configurations like 970,990x, and 990fx
meaning to intel the z77 is mainstream, while to amd the 970 is the mainstream chipset with the less features and not the FM2
so while FM2 is targeted towards mainstream users that isnt really what it was created, the purpose of FM2 and AM3+ is as follows:
AM3+ =chipset with no integrated graphics
FM2 = chipset with integrated graphics(meaning for apus)

2-you are able to buy the top of the line AMD processor and use it on the cheapest least equipped motherboard (970) or even cheaper and older chipsets that are even 2 generationss old(i know some 760 chipsets are compatible with the new FX line which is just awesome in terms of compatibility). with intel if you go intel extreme you are restricted to expensive motherboards. so AMD usualy gives you much more freedom to decide. intel learned alot from AMD to allow more performance/dollar but had a different approach. instead of allowing cheaper chipsets for intel top of the line extreme processors they ended up increasing the performance standard on the mainstream z77 platform with the 2600k being pretty much as fast as intel extremes but without the 2 extra cores, and with both being built on the same process node